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Anonymous

18 Apr 2019

Stocks

Should retail investors perform their own valuation for stocks?

Discussion (1)

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Isaac Chan

07 Mar 2019

Business at NUS

I think it is still possible for retail investors to perform some kind of valuation, to sort of figure out whether a stock is overvalued or undervalued. This is the whole process of value investing which has been opened out to retail investors also.

Complex forms of valuation such as Discounted Cashflow (DCF) Analysis is still too unaccessible to a retail investor I feel, unless you really have the time and knowledge regarding how DCF works and the industry and business itself. Even if you lay out a DCF, it still can be quite challenging to get your assumptions wide, with wide swings in valuation depending on certain assumptions.

Relative valuation might be more accessible, the most common being looking at PE ratios and comparing them across different companies. You can look at other multiples like P/B, P/Sales also, but the most challenge mainly being choosing the right comparable companies.

I would think an easier approach for retail investors would be to look at industries that they are more familair with? Maybe F&B, Retail, Properties etc. I feel that the bottom line is that they need to understand the investments that they are trying to make, and choosing industries that they are more familair with would be better.

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